Re: ICSFM

["Jim M" <petenotped@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

----- Original Message ----- From: "Schrade, Scott"
<sschrade@ascpl.lib.oh.us>

> > It's as close to that as we're ever likely to get.
>
> I have some boots from the '79 tour where they play it & it sounds pretty
> good.  The power & control of Kenny Jones.  Often overlooked.

Thanks, I'll look out for it.  I missed that tour when I compiled the list
of performances last week.  If anyone cares, they played ICSFM 14 times in
1979.

> And like I've said, it doesn't
> translate well live.  It has too many quiet moments; you can't clap along
> to it like "Magic Bus;" the meter is odd (the way Moon played it); it's
> more of a sit & zone out type of song than an exciting live number.

You could say the same thing about Dreaming from the Waist and Music Must
Change, which they played on that 1979 tour.  And the '89 version of ICSFM
isn't a sit and zone out song at all.  It's one of the more rocking tracks
on the album, I think.

> They certainly didn't make much of an attempt to play it in '82.

Well, they played it at ten of the 1982 shows.

> In '89 they could pull it off because there were 32 musicians on stage.

Not sure why that matters.  It's not like there's horns or keyboards in the
song or 8 background vocalists.  I suppose having two guitars was the
difference?  But there are loads of Who songs with multiple guitar tracks
where Pete has to play a kind of amalgum of them live.

> They didn't attempt it in '96, '99, or 2000.  And, as we know, they gave
> it one shot in 2002 & quickly abandoned it.

1999 wasn't really a tour (just 7 shows) and they did attempt it once in
2000 (Oslo), but let's not quibble.  If it's that much of a disaster, it
seems strange that they would go back to have another try on almost every
tour since 1979.

> Bottom line:  It's one of the biggest hits The Who have ever had.  And
> yet they've almost ignored it as a live song.  Reason:  They don't like
> how it comes across live.  Pete & Roger have been at this long enough
> to know that not every song is right for the stage.

I will definitely be searching out a version from '79, '82 or that Mansfield
show and hearing for myself.  I won't buy the assertion that it doesn't make
a good live song until I do.

Jim